


Light

by laugh_a_latte



Category: Be More Chill - Iconis/Tracz
Genre: But I still would say they're making bad decisions, Cigarettes, College, Don't smoke kiddos, Drinking, M/M, Post-Canon, They're adults in this one, boyf riends - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-24
Updated: 2020-11-02
Packaged: 2021-03-09 07:00:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,617
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27169663
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/laugh_a_latte/pseuds/laugh_a_latte
Summary: Jeremy never knew Michael smoked cigarettes.
Relationships: Jeremy Heere & Michael Mell, Jeremy Heere/Michael Mell
Comments: 3
Kudos: 36





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> In which Michael and Jeremy are, let's say, sophomores in college, share an apartment, and are having a rough time.

Jeremy stares at Michael’s back as they walk down the stairs, wondering if he’s really about to do this.

“You okay?”

Jeremy trips a little as the stairs move beneath him. He grips the handrail and giggles.

Michael laughs at him over his shoulder. His cheeks are flushed and he’s wobbly, too, and the doubt Jeremy felt moments ago is swiftly replaced by a swirly numbness, and a guilty sort of contentment that he only gets from drinking too much of Michael’s gin.

No matter what they’re doing, he can’t help but feel safe with Michael.

They reach the bottom of the stairs and fumble their way outside. Jeremy can’t take his eyes off Michael’s shoulders, in that old leather jacket of his.

The streetlight outside their apartment is buzzing, and the bleakness of it is harsh. Jeremy looks at it, and feels comforted, nonetheless.

The air is perfect. Not cold, not hot. Just right. Jeremy’s always loved October.

“It’s so cold out here,” Michael shoves his hand into his pocket.

“You’re always cold,” Jeremy says. His teeth feel numb.

“Heheh yeah.” Michael pulls a crumpled box out of his pocket and flicks it open. He pulls a cigarette out, then offers the box to Jeremy.

“You sure?” Michael asks.

Jeremy said he would, upstairs in their warm apartment, feeling so good after their other roommates went to bed. Because that meant that now it was just him and Michael, and Jeremy could do anything when it was just him and Michael against the world.

But outside, in the bleak light, Jeremy feels like he can’t do a thing. He shakes his head, staring at that box.

Seeing that pack in Michael’s hand is too weird.

“That’s okay,” Michael puts the butt of the cigarette in his mouth, then pulls out a box of matches. He strikes one. “If you want, you can just take a drag off mine.”

Jeremy’s eyes are transfixed on Michael’s hand, on that match. He quickly stuffs the matchbox back in his pocket, then lifts the match to his lips. His other hand is guarding it, though there’s no wind at all.

The flame lights up Michael’s face. The angle of the lighting is all wrong, but it makes his skin glow. Overpowering the shadows under his eyes, and the redness within them.

Michael inhales, shaking the match to extinguish it. He drops it on the sidewalk, then takes the cigarette out of his mouth, holding it with his first two fingers, and exhales. Smoke pours from his lips and out from his nose. 

He closes his eyes and tilts his head ever so slightly back as the cloud dissipates from around him, looking for the world like he’s done this thousands of times before.

Jeremy thought, in his drunken state, that when Michael asked if he wanted to smoke, he meant pot.

Not cigarettes.

Jeremy didn’t even know Michael smoked cigarettes. Not until he saw him stuff that red and white pack into his jacket pocket not two minutes ago.

Michael takes it from his lips, offering it to Jeremy.

“I don’t know how,” Jeremy says. He takes it, trying to hold it like Michael did, but he feels like a fake.

“Just put it in your lips, and inhale,” Michael says, not unkindly. “It’s gonna taste real bad.”

Jeremy shakes his head. Yeah, he figured that was what you were supposed to do, but somewhere deep in his stomach full of booze, the nerves are still there, unshakable.

Jeremy looks at him. Those kind brown eyes tell Jeremy that this is still his Michael, yet Jeremy can’t help but wonder who this guy is, with that half-empty box of cigarettes in his pocket.

He doesn’t think he’s met this Michael before.

God, Jeremy’s plastered.

He puts the orange end near his mouth, like Michael did. Before it even hits his lips, he can taste it. It’s disgusting. He hesitates.

“You just inhale, breathe. It’s gonna taste really bad.”

And while everything in him is screaming not to do this, his stomach is full of gin and his head is empty of everything, except the knowledge that he’s standing next to Michael.

And Jeremy trusts Michael.

Jeremy tries again, and this time, it hits his lips. He inhales.

He feels a burn, in the back of his throat, and a whole forest fire rips down into his lungs. But then he exhales, slowly, and his head gets a little fuzzier. He watches the smoke fall from him, wondering where it came from. He barely tastes anything.

“There,” Michael says. Jeremy hands the cigarette over, already wanting it back. “That was a big hit, dude.”

Jeremy wouldn’t know.

Michael watches the cigarette for a split second before putting it back in his mouth. Jeremy can’t look away. Michael moves to stand next to Jeremy under the awning of that restaurant they live above, long closed for the night, and smokes.

Jeremy shoves his hands in his pockets. He almost coughs, but doesn’t.

“Want one?”

“No,” Jeremy says. His ears are ringing. “If I started, I’d never stop.”

“Yeah,” Michael says, exhaling. The smoke hits Jeremy’s nostrils. Jeremy does want one. “I thought I’d quit, but."

Michael holds the cigarette out a bit, and taps it with his thumb. The ash crumbles away. Jeremy watches it fall. Still air hangs between them.

“When did you start?”

Michael looks at him sideways, and his eyes change.

And Jeremy knows exactly when Michael started, before Michael even says anything.

“Junior year. October.”

“Oh. Yeah.”

“Yeah.”

Jeremy looks away then.

The bus stop in front of them is empty. It’s weird to see it like that. In the daytime, there’s always a small crowd hanging around outside their apartment, waiting for one bus or another. But at one in the morning, no one.

Across the street, a group of men turn the corner, they’re loud and drunk as they cross the street, towards them. Jeremy could laugh at how different that picture is from his. He’s drunk, too, but not like that. Not in a fun way.

“You got a cig?” One of them in the back asks Michael. It makes Jeremy nervous, but Michael just leans against the storefront, and pulls the pack from his pocket. He flicks it open again, and pops one out for the guy to take, then he hands him his matches.

The guy lights up and hands Michael the matches back. “Thanks, man.”

“No problem.” The man nods at Jeremy, then hurries away to catch up with his group.

Jeremy wonders if Michael’s ever bummed a cigarette from someone like that.

It almost makes him sad.

Michael drops the orange butt on the ground, and puts it out with his shoe. He takes out another, and lights up. Jeremy inhales with him. Michael looks like a dragon when he exhales.

“Do you wanna walk to the park?” Michael asks.

“No,” Jeremy says. “If I walk I might puke.”

“I’m definitely gonna puke tonight.”

Jeremy laughs a little. Michael does, too. Inhaling, exhaling. Jeremy lets the smell wash over him.

“I like that smell.”

“Smoke?” Michael’s eyes go wide, almost like a laugh without laughing.

“Yeah.”

“You’re so weird.”

Jeremy smiles. “Yeah.”

Michael coughs. Jeremy breathes in the fresh air. Michael smokes.

“I think I might drop out,” Michael says.

“Yeah?” Jeremy watches the leaves fall.

Michael takes a really long drag, closing his eyes again. “I don’t think I can do college.”

“Oh,” Jeremy feels his stomach clench, fighting between the gin, the nicotine, and this third thing Michael just gave him.

“I don’t really know anymore, what I wanna do.”

Jeremy watches Michael. Michael's not looking at him. He's watching his cigarette burn between his fingers. He drops it, and puts it out with his shoe, not looking up.

Jeremy wants to help, but he doesn’t know what to do, either.

Michael puts his hands back in his pockets, and that’s where they stay.

“Do you wanna go back inside?” Jeremy asks him.

Michael looks up at him, then. He glows under the streetlights.

“Yeah.”

"Okay," Jeremy says. "Let's go back."


	2. Chapter 2

Junior year, October

Of all the things, a shoebox.

Michael stares at it, wondering why the hell everything has to be in a shoebox.

“What’s the matter?” Spencer asks.

Michael pulls his eyes away from the box, to Spencer’s. His heart is beating a little too fast.

He always thought it was funny, that his soda guy’s name was Spencer, and he worked at Spencer’s Gifts. Maybe that’s why they hired him. They certainly should have fired him by now. Michael tries to let that thought distract him.

“Why is it in a shoebox?” Michael asks, barely able to even look at it. His voice sounds funny.

Spencer pats the top of it smugly, raising a thin eyebrow at him.

“All the best things in life come in shoeboxes, my friend.”

Michael shakes his head. Whatever the hell that’s supposed to mean, he doesn’t agree.

Michael swallows, and suddenly has to get out of here, this stupid stuffy back room at Spencer’s gifts, buying this dumb Mountain Dew Red for reasons he can’t even comprehend.

“Hey man, what’s up?” Both of Spencer’s eyebrows are raised now.

Michael coughs over his breath, and shakes his head.

“Come here,” he says. He walks away, and Michael tries to follow without bumping into anything as his panic attack takes over.

Suddenly the dark room becomes bright. Michael follows Spencer out the back door. He leans against the dirty brick wall the minute he’s outside, and tries to pull himself together.

His lungs feel like fire, but the brisk October air helps.

And he feels like an idiot, for letting a stupid shoebox do this to him.

But he’s not surprised. Almost every stupid little thing sends him off nowadays.

Michael presses himself against the wall and tries to let the solidness of it ground him.

He swallows a few times, rubbing his hands over his face, relieved it was only a small attack this time.

“Sorry,” Michael says.

Spencer leans against the wall next to him.

“Nah man, it’s all good,” he says, reaching into his pocket. “That happens to me, too.”

Michael watches him pull out a small box.

“Do you mind if I . . .?”

“No,” Michael says, watching him. “No, go ahead.”

He takes one out, and puts it to his lips, lighting it with a blue lighter.

Blue. That was Jeremy’s favorite color. Michael looks down at the gravel.

The smoke hits his nostrils. Michael breathes it in.

He’s always liked the smell of cigarette smoke. It reminds him of the smell of burning leaves in the fall. Crisp and comforting, warm in a way.

Michael feels so cold.

Spencer moves the pack towards Michael, offering it to him like it’s a pack of gum. Michael looks at it. 

“You smoke?” Spencer asks.

And Michael does, yeah. But not cigarettes—And not anytime recently. The last time he tried, that night he realized Jeremy had blocked him out forever, he couldn’t. It sent him into one of his worst panic attacks yet. He just couldn’t.

It’s just, he always got high with Jeremy.

And Michael misses it, and he wants to, but he can’t, and it’s so weird that he can’t even begin to have the words for it.

He misses that high.

Any high.

Anything to stop feeling all this.

Anything to feel anything at all.

Michael takes one.

“I don’t,” Michael says, staring at it. He tries to hold it like he’s seen in movies. “I don’t know how.”

Spencer looks at him sideways.

“I don’t think you wanna start,” he says.

And Michael knows he’s right. He knows he shouldn’t, and he knows he’s just desperate for anything, any sort of comfort, since all his other comforts don’t really work anymore. And he just doesn’t want to feel like this anymore.

Michael swallows back the pain in his throat. He doesn’t want to cry anymore, either.

“Do you know how much pot your buddies sell me?” Michael asks him, trying to throw some sort of sarcasm into his voice.

Spencer laughs next to him. “Fair shit.”

Michael lifts the cigarette to his lips. And it’s disgusting.

But Michael’s full of adrenaline, and need, and he doesn’t care.

Plus, Spencer’s already handed him the lighter.

Michael lights it, inhaling, like Spencer just did.

And the smoke burns his throat, and his chest, and he feels like he might die for a split second. And he regrets it immediately, involuntary tears stinging his eyes, wondering why the hell anyone ever did this in the first place as he tries not to cough.

But then . . . He relaxes.

And all of his thoughts stop . . . 

. . . And everything is okay.

And he coughs anyway, but he doesn’t care, because for the first time since Jeremy took the Squip, it doesn’t hurt.

Michael laughs, smoke pouring from him. He watches it float away as all his thoughts return.

“Woah,” Spencer says.

Michael coughs. He feels like he might throw up.

“I don’t think I can—” Michael swallows. His mouth tastes awful. “I don’t think I can finish this.”

Spencer drops the orange butt of his. “I can finish it, if you’re done.”

“Yeah,” Michael says, already missing that feeling. The world comes back into focus around him, and he doesn’t like that one bit. But Michael gives Spencer the rest of the cigarette, anyway. “Yeah, I’m done.”

Michael breathes out, his body feeling so heavy. He tries to remember that light, blurry feeling, but knows it’s in vain.

After all, he doesn’t want to become addicted or anything.


	3. Chapter 3

Sophomore Year, College

Michael pulls the blanket over his head, and curls into himself.

He can’t. He told himself he’d stop.

Then why didn’t he throw them out, after last time?

He should have thrown them out.

But he couldn’t, because, well. Because.

God, he can’t believe he’d even _started_ again in the first place. He was just drunk, and . . .

Michael rubs his hands over his face, hard. He reaches blindly for his phone, and flinches when the bright screen tells him it’s nearly two in the morning.

Well. At least no one will be awake to see.

Michael shoves the covers off, and grabs his leather jacket from the floor.

He quietly opens his door, lifting it slightly off the hinges so it won’t squeak. He shoves his sneakers on and hurries as quickly as he can out and down the stairs, pulling his jacket on as he does.

Finally, the cool air outside is on his face, and he’s almost not suffocating anymore. He takes his place leaning against the grate of the closed restaurant. Michael hits his head softly against it, and looks up.

The streetlight blinds him from being able to see any stars. It’s just darkness beyond that stark glow.

A car passes in front of him, blowing the red light. Michael breathes, telling himself he can’t do this as he reaches into his pocket.

But his hand finds that old box quickly, and the matches soon after.

He’s nearly out, but maybe that’s for the best.

He bought this pack years ago, the last of many, and stopped halfway. He’d been able to quit so easily, then, with Jeremy by his side again. What made him begin had ended, and he didn’t need to rely on these things anymore.

But he’s never felt so lost, before. What he felt back then, in his late teenage years, was nothing compared to how lost he feels now.

Why didn’t he just throw these damn things away?

Michael flicks open the box, and takes one out.

And he shouldn’t. He knows that, as it touches his lips. He doesn’t even have the excuse of being drunk this time.

So he really shouldn’t.

But he does.

Michael strikes the match. He missed that sound.

And he lights it, inhaling.

The relief is immediate and all consuming, a rolling boil simmering down to blurry bubbles. It’s something telling him everything will be okay. And Michael just wants everything to be okay again.

The smoke fills him, and he surrenders to it.

How’d he ever get along without this?

Michael exhales, shuddering as he does.

How’d he ever get along without this.

He puts it back to his lips, breathing in.

And only then does he notice Jeremy, standing in the front door to their building, staring at him.

The door falls from his hand. Something cold pools into Michael’s stomach, at the way Jeremy is looking at him.

“Hey,” Michael says, smoke pouring from him.

It’s the same look from the other night, like Jeremy had never seen him before.

But Michael’s not drunk tonight, so he doesn’t dismiss it so easily.

“Hi,” Jeremy says. He looks nervous.

Michael feels about the same, but his head is a little lighter, so it doesn’t hit as intensely as it normally would.

Michael lifts the cigarette to his lips again, taking a long drag. It fills him up, in a way nothing else could.

“Michael, are you . . . okay?”

Michael exhales, and feels empty.

“Yeah,” he says.

Jeremy doesn’t move.

Michael wishes, on that night, that he’d never offered Jeremy a drag. He hopes that it wasn’t enough. He can feel those eyes boring a hole in the side of his head.

The shaky grate shifts when Jeremy leans against it.

Michael taps the side of the cigarette with his thumb before taking another drag. He needs to let go, and let it take him. Only when he does will he be able to float away, from all of this.

Michael’s so lost in that thought that he inhales too much. He coughs into his elbow, and it hurts.

He feels Jeremy tense up beside him.

“Do . . . Do you wanna talk about it?” Jeremy asks.

Michael really doesn’t.

But he also really does.

And it doesn’t make sense.

It never makes sense, talking to anyone. Sometimes even talking to Jeremy. Especially after everything with the Squip.

Michael looks down and the burning cigarette in his hand, almost to the filter.

It’s just, he didn’t have anyone to talk to, for all that time back in Junior year.

He couldn’t talk to Jeremy. He couldn’t get high without it sending him into a panic attack. He couldn’t do anything.

So Michael found another way to stop feeling everything so intensely. Without talking. Without pot. Without Jeremy.

And so Michael doesn’t know how to talk about this, with anyone.

Especially with Jeremy.

What’s there to say?

Michael really did think things would be better in college. But he was wrong, like he often is. And so, he’s back to this.

Only now, Jeremy’s here.

Michael lets the orange filter fall from his hand. He rubs it on the ground with his shoe.

“Michael?” Jeremy asks. Michael forgot they were talking.

“Do you want one?”

“No,” Jeremy says.

Michael nods, silently thankful. He couldn’t live with himself if he got Jeremy hooked, from that one stupid drag. That’s all it took for him.

Michael lights another, unable to look at Jeremy as he does.

Jeremy’s not supposed to see this.

If they hadn’t all gotten so drunk, that one stupid night.

“I can’t do this anymore, Jere,” Michael says, shaking the match out.

Jeremy is silent for a moment. “College?”

Michael isn’t even sure what he meant, really. But he just nods anyway, blowing smoke away from Jeremy.

“Oh,” Jeremy says.

A couple walks by them. The shorter girl coughs at Michael. Michael watches them walk away.

“I don’t know. It’s just too much. And everyone, everything, just,” Michael shakes his head. The words, what are the words, he always wonders. He hasn’t had them, not for years. “Too much.”

Jeremy coughs.

And it’s all his fault. It always feels like his fault.

“I’m sorry,” Michael says. “I’m so sorry.”

“Michael—” Jeremy starts, but it catches in another cough.

And Michael feels like an idiot.

“God,” Michael drops it, putting it out with his shoe. He kicks it at it, suddenly needing to get as far away from the stupid thing as possible. “God, Jere,” Michael rubs his hands over his face, up into his hair. “I’m so sorry.”

Michael’s chest hurts. And his throat hurts, and everything feels so heavy. He coughs, and suddenly he’s crying.

“I’m sorry, Jeremy,” Michael falls against the grate, willing his knees to not give out.

“What are you sorry for?” 

Michael shakes his head. Where to even begin.

For wanting to drop out, when they were supposed to be cool in college together, for even having the thought of dropping out in the first place, or maybe for ever giving Jeremy the ridiculous hope that everything would be okay, in college.

And for making him cough, for offering him a drag, even though they were so drunk that night, for smoking, for ever smoking in the first place all the way back in Junior year, because all of it is so disappointing, and Michael knows it. 

Michael knows he’s just so disappointing, but he could never even have the words for it, which makes him just that much more pathetic because it just makes him want to smoke another, and another, and another, because he doesn’t need words when he does.

Michael cries.

He can’t tell if Jeremy is crying or not, but he can’t stop to check.

He’s just so sorry.

“All of it,” is what he says.

“It’s okay,” Jeremy says. But Michael knows it’s a lie. “We’re gonna get through it.”

Michael isn’t so sure.

“It’s all gonna be okay.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn't think I'd continue this but here we are. Maybe more to come if y'all like it?
> 
> Thank you for reading!!! Any feedback at all - including constructive criticism - is super appreciated! <3
> 
> (And disclaimer: please do not smoke cigarettes! I definitely romanticized it up for the sake of I needed some catharsis, but it's not pretty. Make good decisions! :)


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